Thrill of the Hunt viable in 5.4?

As far as I know, Dire Beast is superior over Thrill of the hunt as it stands now (even though it's awesome for AoE). But with these changes: "Arcane Shot had its damage and focus cost increased by 50%" will it become viable as a talent?

I know that as a Marksman Hunter one of the issues I had with this talent was that I always had more than enough focus, which is actually a waste. I'm wondering if this will make it a viable option because in AoE situations it will basically let you spam Multi-Shot for ever. So in those situations I really miss it.

Viable? It's practically a necessity once you get the tier pieces as the numbers stand right now - currently it's a dps increase to Arcane Shot instead of Kill Command on the PTR, which is the meaning behind a lot of the hunter talk on the front page of Mochampz today... so those numbers not being final it's pretty hard to say, but my hunch is that it'll still be pretty fucking useful with the set bonuses.

Viable? It's practically a necessity once you get the tier pieces as the numbers stand right now - currently it's a dps increase to Arcane Shot instead of Kill Command on the PTR, which is the meaning behind a lot of the hunter talk on the front page of Mochampz today... so those numbers not being final it's pretty hard to say, but my hunch is that it'll still be pretty fucking useful with the set bonuses.

I tried a few 100 million parses on the ptr and at no point was skipping the main abilities a dps gain, it always resulted in a dps loss.

As far as I know, Dire Beast is superior over Thrill of the hunt as it stands now (even though it's awesome for AoE). But with these changes: "Arcane Shot had its damage and focus cost increased by 50%" will it become viable as a talent?

I know that as a Marksman Hunter one of the issues I had with this talent was that I always had more than enough focus, which is actually a waste. I'm wondering if this will make it a viable option because in AoE situations it will basically let you spam Multi-Shot for ever. So in those situations I really miss it.

Thoughts?

Ahh... A fellow Marksman. We seem to be far and few between these days (at least PVE wise). I miss the glory days, but I love wrecking hunters in terms of damage output who are going with BM simply because its puts a tad bit higher damage.
Anywho, In many ways TotH looks to be a viable option, in fact, probably even the best option especially with 2xT16. I really don't even need to look at sims, and I know I will be picking it up. I've tried both over the past couple months (I've gotten very used to both of them), and while right now there is a slight dps increase with DB, I prefer TotH because there is one less button to press, and I don't focus starve myself for AoEing in boss fights (there seems to be quite a few AoE encounters).
So all things equal with the PTR notes, I would def say TotH will be standing proud.

Rule of thumb for at least Kill Command is to never delay an Arcane Shot in order to do a Kill Command. Instead, delay KC by about 0.5-1 sec and weave in more Arcane Shots. Using KC just as it comes of CD is not a DPS gain, nor is it a DPS gain to ignore it. However, they are aware of the current state of KC so we can just hope that they buff it somewhat to make it more significant.

Regarding TotH, it definitely looks like it will be a viable option with 2set.

On ptr my kill commands do avg around 200-240k, arcane shots barely crit around 190k. For the same gcd, that isn't a dps gain.

KC currently with the set bonuses taken into account etc, arcane shot is currently better unless in bestial wrath, thats already been acknowledged by blue posts and with the readiness changes this sort of thing will hopefully be taken into account.

Honestly the set bonuses are an absolute mess for us, in MM u wanna use arcane shot for 2 set but aimed shot for 4 set so you won't use one of them. survival u will wanna explosive shot half the fight with the 4set but u want to use arcane shot for the 2 set and BM u cant even reach the stacks properly and keep in mind especially if you take TotH the 2 set bonus is worth the loss of KC as it stands

its sort of a moot point though atm as things such as talent choices, stat weights and rotation is very likely gonna change in the coming few weeks

For once maybe someone will call me "Sir" without adding "You're making a scene"

I would be very surprised if once you have T16 2p TotH didn't become the best talent on that row. Sure it does slightly less damage than dire beast at the moment, but with the increased damage/focus cost of AS AND the fact that AS reduces the cooldown on RF, arcaneshotspam will surely win out.

I would be very surprised if once you have T16 2p TotH didn't become the best talent on that row. Sure it does slightly less damage than dire beast at the moment, but with the increased damage/focus cost of AS AND the fact that AS reduces the cooldown on RF, arcaneshotspam will surely win out.

yeah definitely and they have talked aboutt maybe having something like signature shots hit harder probably for more focus i guess is the plan so less spam more hard hitting abilities the only issue again with that is we'd be left spamming cobra shot for focus or going more haste. I would hate to see a full arcane spam being better than using KC CS or ES but they seem to be listening to our input and it's not gonna happen overnight at least

personally i'm really looking forward to these changes, I think it will either make our play better or be a step in the right direction. and anything that can reduce the overlap with problems in pve and pvp is great in my books

For once maybe someone will call me "Sir" without adding "You're making a scene"